The Hero
by The Girl in the Red Jacket
Summary: The long in coming companion piece to The Peacemaker. This ones from Jason's POV.


Disclaimer: If I owned Jason (or Austin St. John for that matter) do you think I would waste my time writing about him?   
  
Author's Notes: Here is the long in coming companion to The Peacemaker. I don't think it's as good as The Peacemaker. The Trini/Jason scene isn't as strong but I hit a major case of blockage for this story that I had trouble plowing through. Thanks goes to everyone who reviewed the Peacemaker and requested another one. And special thanks goes to Didi for inspiring me to keep going with this one when she wrote In Silence.   
  
  
The Hero  
  
  
I am a hero.  
  
But I never asked to be one. I never wanted to anyone's hero. It just kind of happened when I wasn't looking. I mean, I've always tried to include everyone and be nice to everyone. I hate seeing people hurt because of some sort of prejudice. I can't stand seeing bullies pick on other kids. It just doesn't make any sense to me. Why would someone beat up another human being because they're smarter or smaller or weaker than them? It doesn't make sense.   
  
I once overheard Billy tell Trini that I was his hero. It was said shortly after our first battle and was a rare burst of emotion from him. I think Trini agreed with him, saying something about how they had just become heros while I'd been one for awhile. To be honest I wasn't really paying attention to what she said.  
  
What Billy said had floored me.  
  
Before then I had never thought, never even considered myself a hero. I mean, how different am I than anyone else? I have just always done what my gut tells me is right. That doesn't make me a hero, does it? I don't see in myself whatever it is the others see in me.   
  
But I see it in them.   
  
I don't think any of them would believe me if I told them I thought they were the heros, not me. Zack would make a joke of it, hiding behind his humour as he always does. Trini would deny it and throw the line back at me. Kim would blush and giggle before dismissing it by changing the subject. And Tommy...he would get that haunted look in his eyes and tell me he couldn't be a hero after everything he's done.   
  
Someday I will manage to convince him that whole fiasco was not his fault but for now I'm just trying to help him through those nightmares he keeps having. God, it's awful on him some nights, especially when Goldar taunts him during a battle. I know he's going to call tonight. The Green Ranger Powers weren't all that steady today. They managed to hold out for most of the battle but towards the end they failed him. He collapsed and just barely managed to roll out of the way before Goldar's sword came down on him. The look on his face when the Powers deserted him...I'll never forget it. He looked so hopeless. His eyes were so hollow it scared me. Goldar's jeers and taunting didn't help matters but Tommy teleported out before that stupid monkey had another chance to hurt him. The Power loss is really starting to take a toll on him.   
  
I still kick myself for not getting the Green Candle. I'll always kick myself for not getting it from Rita. Some hero I am. I couldn't even save my best friend's powers.  
  
Then there's Billy, my little bro. I always knew there was something special about Billy. Even when I stopped those bullies from beating him up I knew that there was something that compelled me to help him beyond my normal reasoning. And that look in his eyes when the cowards ran off, a cross between admiration and relief and thanks that surprised me. I swore to myself I would help him from that moment on. I decided then and there I would do whatever it took to protect him from getting hurt again.  
  
But I can't always protect him, or the rest of them. I can't even protect myself from the things I've had to see or do.  
  
All of us have lost our childhood innocense by now. Trini and Kim lost it that horrible day at the school yard. I will never forget that day either, I still dream about it sometimes. The image of those children lying there covered in their own blood...it will haunt me for the rest of my life. You never forget things like that. Every face of every person we've lost will haunt me until the day I die.  
  
Trini hasn't been the same since that day in the school yard. You can't tell unless you know her really well but she has changed so much since we got our powers. I think we all have. Kim won't go near the building anymore. And she tries so hard to be perky and happy for everyone. She clings to that happy go lucky part of herself and I hope she never lets it go. She deserves to have that type of personality to fall back on when things aren't tough. Zack lost his innocence before the girls did. On our fourth time out a man his father works with was killed. Zack knew his sons. It was the first death we hadn't been able to prevent. Before that I don't think any of us realized of real what we were doing was. Now we have something to make up for; or at least I feel I do.   
  
Billy. He didn't have a chance to lose his innocence as Ranger. All those years of being bullied took it away from him and losing his mother was the end of any final shred he hung onto. I should know, I with him the night of her death as he cried himself to sleep and watched as it was sapped out of him without being able to do one damn thing about it. Losing her killed a part of him that he will never be able to get back. No matter how much he was hurt by the bullies at school his mom could always come up with some way to make it hurt less. She was a wonderful women, always coming up with there goofy, half serious experiments for us to try as kids or pushing us to go out and experience the world around us. Her death shook me. I can't really imagine the full extent of what it did to Billy.  
  
I haven't gotten any details out of Tommy yet but I know something happened to him before he was adopted. In gym, as part of the health unit, we had a discussion on child abuse and this look came over his face. I don't even know how to describe a look like that. He wouldn't talk to anyone for the rest of the day. In class he just kind of stared straight ahead as if there was no one else there, or as if he wasn't there. I don't know which. I tried to get him to talk to me later that night. He stammered a bit without really saying anything and then told me it was too hard for him to tell me, for now, but that he would later.  
  
I won't push him to talk yet but he knows I want to find out someday. I just hope he can learn to trust me, and the rest of the team, enough to tell us. I want to be there for him but it's hard to help when you don't know what's wrong.   
  
I no longer remember what it's like to be innocent like that only what it's like to lose it. I wish I could remember what it's like to have that sort of innocence. The sort of childhood innocence you have when your parents can still make everything alright and every story has a happy ending and the biggest worry you have is staying up past your bedtime. But watching a family member slowly die sucks that innocense out of you real fast. My grandfather never lived farther than ten minutes away. He was the kind of grandpa who knew all the best stories, let you play with the neat, old toys he had and always slipped candy or a dollar into your pocket when your parents weren't looking. When I was told he was never going to get better I had the rug pulled out from under me. There's not a lot left for you to hold onto when someone close to you is dying. Being there when that person dies is enough to rip whatever you've got left of your childhood innocence away so brutally you can never find it again.  
  
I wasn't meant to be there when he died. It was an accident but it still happened. He had two strokes before he was hospitalized and sighed a do not resuscitate form. I was visiting him when he had a massive heart attack. My parents rushed me out of the room but not before I heard the loud screech that came from the heart monitor. I wasn't supposed to be visiting him, I was too young, but my grandma managed to convince the nurses to let me in.   
  
I was six when it happened. No one but Billy knows about it and he only knows because he came with me to his grave once. I let go of that experience a long time ago. I had to. You can't live if you hold on to that kind of grief. I'll always love him and I visit his grave every so often but I've gotten past what happened.   
  
*Ring*  
  
It never fails. Every time I start thinking too seriously something interrupts me. Nowadays it's usually my communicator.  
  
*Ring*  
  
"Damn phone. I should have put it on my night stand," I mutter as I make my way to the phone. My room isn't the cleanest and there's lots of things to trip over which is what I'm doing now.   
  
*Ring*  
  
"God dammit! Stupid shoes! What are they doing there?"  
  
*Ring*  
  
"Hello?"  
  
"Hey, Jase." Trini's voice is soft when she replies. I don't like the tone in it. It's like the day in the school yard. I understand why as well. Tommy wasn't the only one who had trouble with today's battle.  
  
"Hey yourself," I reply, "I was wondering if you'd call. Has Kim been in touch?"  
  
"Yeah, and Zack too for a few minutes at least," Trini sighed, "You talked to him earlier, I take it? He usually has more to say."  
  
"Yup. After Billy and before Tommy. I'm going to have to start getting them to book appointments before hand, I think." I had spent most of the night on the phone and the other bit telling my parents I didn't really want to know about the Power Rangers' latest battle.  
  
"Me too. I think Kim will book double time," Trini tried for a laugh but couldn't quite manage it. I know the feeling. "How is Tommy feeling? Any better?"  
  
"He's still shaken up pretty badly but today was hard on him. He's okay physically now."   
  
After the battle Kim had found Tommy retching in the Power Chamber bathroom. It was partly because of stress and partly because of the waning Powers. Zordon assured us that he would be alright, that there would be no permanent damage when the Powers fail him for the last time, but the Power loss is taking a toll on Tommy. Too big a toll. I'm worried about him despite Zordon's reassurances. He'll be okay after he loses the Powers for good but what about until then?  
  
"That's something," Trini's voice shook a little as she vented something that had been on my mind lately as well, "God, Jase, what happens if his Powers fail him when he's fighting by himself? What is we can't get to him in time to help?"  
  
"It won't happen," I reply steadily. 'I won't let it happen,' I add mentally. I'd rather take a few hits with my suit to shield me than to let Tommy take one without protection. And if protecting him means taking a hit without my suit then so be it.   
  
"But what if it does?" Trini insisted.  
  
"I don't know. I haven't thought about it all that much," Truth be told, I had thought about it, probably more often than I should have too. But my final solution to the problem, or lack there of of a solution, wasn't something she needed to hear.  
  
"Like hell you haven't thought about it Jase! I know you and I know how close you and Tommy are. If you haven't thought about it then I'm a monkey's uncle...uh...a monkey's aunt."  
  
I couldn't help it. That comment was too good to pass up. I started making monkey noises. It saved me from having to answer too. Maybe it wasn't the most original thing to do but it made Trini laugh. Her laughter wasn't a sound you heard much anymore. It's a shame too. I just realized how beautiful her laugh sounds.   
  
"Jason, you're impossible sometimes!" Trini giggled.   
  
"Come on, you know you love me!" I meant it to be a light comment but it didn't work that way. Trini fell completely silent.   
  
"Trini..." I began after a few moments of uneasy silence. I hadn't meant it that way. But her next question made me think the silence wasn't because of my flippant comment.  
  
"Jase, can you...do you think you can come over for awhile? My parents are already in bed. They won't know," Trini requested.   
  
I hesitated. The question caught me off guard. I had expected maybe anything but that. But there was nothing more I'd like to do than go over to Trini's house. I actually wasn't all that fond of talking on the phone, though you wouldn't have been able to tell that tonight. Talking face to face had always seemed so much more personal to me. But I had also told Tommy earlier to call if he needed an ear or a shoulder.  
  
"I'll be right over," I tell her. My communicator is always on, actually I'm not sure if you can turn them off. If Tommy needs me he can still get a hold of me.   
  
It takes me about five seconds to get from my room to her room via the wonder of teleportation. I have the feeling that the length of time is too long for Trini. She's not crying but I can tell something has upset her. I don't waste any time in taking her into my arms. It's then I realize that she's trembling.   
  
"What happened?" I ask gently.   
  
"I was listening to the radio. I...They gave the death count from today's battle," Trini confessed. "Before I could turn it off they had this mother on. Jase, she lost her son today. I didn't even know any children were killed."  
  
"Oh Trini," I murmur softly.   
  
"I'm sorry. I don't mean to be like this. I know you probably had something better to do, like sleep, but I just...I didn't want to be alone." Trini mumbled before burying her face deeper into my shirt.  
  
"Don't be sorry. It's okay," I tell her as I stroke her long, dark hair. "I'm here for you."  
  
I hold her, standing there in the middle of her room, for a long time. I don't think I could let Trini go even if I wanted to. I don't think she would let me. Her grip on me slowly loosens and she leans more into the embrace. I draw back a little to confirm what I think. She's falling asleep on me.   
  
"Come on, Trini. Let's get you into bed," I suggest. Before now I hadn't even notice she's in her pj's. I never change for bed until I'm already half in bed.  
  
"Mmm," Trini mumbles and I take it for an affirmative answer. She climbs into bed willingly but when I lift my communicator to teleport out she grabs my rest.   
  
"Stay until I'm asleep," Trini requests.  
  
"Trini..." I sigh. If her parents were to catch me in her room while she was asleep...  
  
"Please."  
  
"Alright, I'll stay," I can't deny her. Not when she's looking at me with eyes red from unshed tears but at the same time so trusting and affectionate.   
  
"Thanks," Trini whispers as she snuggles further into the covers and closes her eyes.   
  
"Don't worry about it," I reply and, before I can stop myself, kiss her lightly on the cheek.   
  
She just smiles, already half asleep and probably unaware of what I just did.   
  
It's late when I teleport home. I stayed with Trini longer than I should have after she had fallen asleep. She just looked so beautiful...and so peaceful. I'm glad she can find peace when she sleeps, she deserves peace.   
  
I wish I could find some too.  
  
I'm utterly exhausted, completely wiped out. There's nothing I'd like more at the moment then to flop into bed and drop off myself. But I can't.  
  
An image that I have been shoving to the back of my mind all day surges forth. The little boy, the one Trini hadn't known about, the way he looked when I saw him. Yeah, I knew about him before Trini did. I was the one who first found him.   
  
He couldn't have been more than six. I found him, lying ever so still on the grass of the park, a ghastly burn covering most of his torso and singeing his Power Rangers t-shirt.   
  
I teleported him to the hospital but it was too late to save him. Matthew Baker. Another name to put on a gravestone. Another person who won't wake up tomorrow. Another child who won't get to grow up. It rips me apart to think about it but I can't think of anything else.  
  
I can fell tracks of moisture rolling down my cheeks but I don't have the heart to brush them away. Here, in the dark of my room where no one can see me I don't have to be so strong. I don't have to be everyone's rock. I don't have to be a hero. I can let myself cry for the innocent people we lost today and for the weight I carry in my heart because I couldn't save them.  
  
Sometimes, it's hard to be a hero. 


End file.
